Culinary Travel

Despite its reputation for wealth and luxury, Cortina is a relatively inexpensive place to dine out. Perhaps it’s because the proliferation of restaurants all serving similar menus has possibly brought competing prices down, or maybe it’s the access to good primary ingredients, a waning of fame in the area, an aging tourist population… regardless, I’m…

Cortina d’Ampezzo is in the Belluno province in the Dolomite mountain range, just outside the borders of the Südtirol, which itself abuts Austria. This close proximity to the border brings a melding of cultures and cuisines. The town is not so heavily influenced as many of the villages over this Tyrolese border, where you’re more likely…

There is a dearth in my photo stream. And until now, there has been a similar gaping omission on this page… I haven’t written about langos. The reason is twofold. Only one is the lack of photo – these magnificent deep fried bundles were simply not in front of me long enough to shoot. The…

In a previous post, I discussed the difficulties that wine tasting travellers may face whilst attempting to visit the region of Champagne. It’s not so straightforward as visiting many other wine regions around the world, and needs just a little foreplanning if you wish to do it properly. Many will be surprised by the lack…

I recently had quite an incredible lunch at a two michelin star restaurant just outside San Sebastian. This same restaurant is on the World’s 50 Best list, raising its Basque head at number 7. My companions were 15 Australian and British middle aged, middle-high income diners, with an Austrian thrown in for good measure. For…

Although Champagne is one of the most well known wines in the world, visiting the region is not as simple as many would expect, especially if you want to get the best of it. After two visits with plenty of research and aforethought, I’m still learning what it’s all about, and realising I’ve missed some of the…

On my fifth day in San Sebastian, I was perched in a seafood restaurant at the tiny port of Bahia de la Concha on a rickety wooden folding chair about the size of a postage stamp. With a personality that requires elbows often to be airborne, I quickly found myself talking to the people on…

I remember the days when I used to travel with microwaveable tomato soup, apple sauce and single-serve packets of Rice Crispies. I try to repress that moment when surrounded by friends in a nice bistro in Nice, my eldest son declared at a thousand decibels, that he “will NOT eat the risotto because it tastes like ca-ca!”…

I never realised the kids would love it quite so much. This little side jaunt from our skiing trip was for me, not them, and yet, I discovered that putting children into a michelin starred kitchen to learn how to make traditional Bolognese peasant food is actually a very clever diversion.